Issues with College in America
By Matthew Chiccino
Education is really important, but systems are pretty flawed here in the US. Here are my thoughts on what's done wrong.
1. Growth vs. Enrollment
For those who don't know, private institutions don't fund their schools directly from tuition payments. Instead, they have pools of money which they invest and grow. This is called their endowment. The returns from these investments are used to fund operations across the school.
Many schools like mine (Boston University) don’t disclose how or where this money is invested. This lack of transparency makes me inclined to believe it's tied to industries or companies which contradict BUs public message around ethics, equity, and sustainability.
The size of these endowments are shocking. Harvard alone has an endowment of over $50 billion. This is more than most countries entire GDP!! In just the past 5 years, their endowment grew 32%. However, their class size increased 0%. From 1985 to now, their endowment grew 435%, but they only increased the size of their incoming class by 4%. (source) The almost one trillion dollars in endowments held by private schools in the US, growing well beyond the rate of inflation, would lead you to believe they are decreasing the cost of attendance. Of course, the opposite is true.
Professor Scott Galloway explains a process called the LVMH strategy. This is the idea of artificially constraining supply to create scarcity and aspiration. Therefore the ability to raise prices at an accelerated rate. This is exactly what private institutions are doing.
Old Homeowners do the same thing with housing through efforts to prevent new homes from being built in surrounding areas. Designer brands are entirely built on this principle of intentional scarcity. Here is my strong opinion: The education in my country is NOT a Birkin bag. Education in my country should not fall to the fate of strategic fiscal greed. If a college's endowment grows faster than their enrollment, they are no longer a school, they are a hedge fund that offers classes.
Northeastern University is a great example of abusing this process. This year Northeastern university received 105,000 applications for their undergraduate programs, each application costing $75. This is a ridiculous amount of money which then gets re-spent to promote more applicants; just to reject them and push down their acceptance rate. Northeastern's acceptance rate went from 32% to 5% in the past 10 years. I don't believe the value of the degree or education increased by 540% in this time. Instead its strategic and performative.
Acceptance rate is the largest metric of prestige of US colleges. In my eyes this is the quality of education being determined by a game of appearances and fraudulent value.
2. Inequity
My second argument is that elite higher education actually perpetuates privilege and deepens inequality. I assume that higher education is meant to be gateway to opportunity. But I believe it serves as a gatekeeper of status and elevates the already advantaged.
The admissions process favors kids from high income areas with resources to expensive test prep, elite prep schools, legacy admission, and donors. Clearly this leads to a self-selected class of students who aren't particularly exceptional, but rather exceptionally well off. This isn't a meritocracy, this is reinforcing a hierarchy.
I am a proponent of DEI initiatives and affirmative action because they challenge this issue. That said, I believe there are ways we can improve these efforts to better serve those most in need. My school prides itself on its global and cultural diversity. However, I've noticed this often comes in the form of enrolling ultra wealthy international students who can spend an even higher premium on the already undiscounted tuition. Global representation is valuable, but I worry that this is a financially strategic appoach instead of a genuine commitment to equity. It disallocates resources to students who face real barriers to entry and access to opportunity.
I think Affirmative action would be more effective with stronger emphasis on socioeconomic backgrounds. The top 1% aren’t in dire need for more doors to be opened for them. Instead we should prioritize the bottom 90% and give them the tools to rise. That, to me, is what educational equity looks like.
To me, it seems that the objective of top institutions is identifying a superclass of individuals and accelerating their path to disproportionate opportunities and wealth. My opinion is that there are no valid indicators of who is deserving of this at 17 years old. This system of spending, conditioning, and pressuring children to meet arbitrary standards is not an accurate measurement of ability nor worthiness. Instead, it is an unfair judgment that unfortunately favors privilege and perpetuates inequality and unfairness.
Perhaps I may be bitter I didn't get accepted into an ivy league, and I do attend a rich private school. But I am an advocate for education, decency, and meritocracy. A society's level of education is correlated to economic growth (source). Education is not something we should restrict, its something we need to expand. Focusing on privilege and profit, and scarcity undermines the sole purpose of education, and that's what I see as the issue with colleges, specifically prestigious private colleges, in America.
Solution:
- Further fund public schools.
- Make endowment payout minimums.
- Require schools to disclose how and where endowments are invested.
- Ban commercialization of college applications: No marketing for the sake of lowe acceptance.
- Emphasis on economic-based affirmative action
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